Recurrance
by azara3
Summary: The Lyoko Warriors kids' come to Kadic and find out about their parents' enemy, and may even have to fight it. Overdone story plot, but good nonetheless. R&R, no flamers please.
1. Chapter 1

On the plane to France, I sulked. I liked my home in America, thank you very much. And then, right before high school, Mom and Dad decide it would be a good idea to send me to France. "You'll love Kadic Academy," Mom assured me, after a particularly difficult French lesson. "And didn't you always say, you would want to see where Grandma and Grandpa live?"

"Yeah, when I was, like five," I had snorted.

"Well, now's your chance," Dad had said firmly. "And if its any consolation, I don't like going to see your mom's parents either. They always did creep me out."

"Quiet, Ulrich. Besides, we're not even staying there, remember?"

"Oh, yeah. Well, good."

They weren't staying with Grandma and Grandpa. They were staying with some old friends of theirs on-campus. The worst part was that I could stay with them. I was to have a dorm. With a _roommate_.

"You can't get any more nostalgic than a dorm," Dad told me. "And you can't _possibly_ have a worse roommate than I did. I'll ask Jeremy if he can get you to share a room with his girl, Maya. She's very nice."

"Isn't her hair pink?" I said, determined not to like this Maya. "I hate pink."

But Mom and Dad wouldn't let me stay behind. They told me that they had to come over to France anyway, and they weren't leaving me. I agreed, under the promise that it would only be a year.

That they hoped it would only be a year.

My only consolation was that I would be a freshman in a place I couldn't care less about.

"Ulrich, buddy!" I heard the obnoxious voice before I saw its owner: a guy with blond hair glued straight up with a purple blotch in the center, in a sick plum-colored Armani tux. Good old Uncle Odd. "Yumi, you Japanese freak! How you doing?" he rushed over to give my parents a rib-cracking hug.

"We were doing good until you broke our spines," Dad said, giving Uncle Odd one of his rare smiles. "How are you?"

"Doing well, doing well!" he boomed, beaming at his old friends. "Richie is just psyched to be going to our old school. And Milly is glad to be back as well. She's taken up a temporary job as the director of the journalism program at old Kadic."

"Really?" Mom asked. "That's great!"

"What isn't great is the news she brought back from the interview," Odd said, suddenly serious. "Old Jimbo is principal, and the Sissy and William's kid is going to the school too."

"Jim is principal?" Dad exclaimed.

"Sissy and William had a kid?" Mom cried.

"Can we just go already?" I whined. "By the time you old folks are done catching up, I'll have already graduated!" The "old folks" looked at me, and Uncle Odd boomed out laughter.

"She's right, you know. Let's grab your bags, kiddo," he grinned, bouncing off to the baggage pickup.

"He never stops," Mom said, shaking her head slowly. "And who are you calling old?"

The Hermitage was old. I knew as soon as I saw it that I was better off in a dorm. At least there, I could get a cell phone reception. And hot water. I walked into the sounds of a piano playing "Twinkle Twinkle." Yay, another jump back in time. And I don't even get a cool Delorean to go with it.

"Hey, Jeremy? Aelita? Is anyone home?" Odd called out to the house. "It's Odd, Ulrich, and Yumi! Oh, and they're kid!" The music stopped, and a girl rushed out into the hallway. She had pink hair. Her eyes widened when she saw us, and ran to give Uncle Odd a hug. "Hey kiddo!" he exclaimed, picking her up and swinging her around with a grunt. "Man, I _am_ old. How you doing?"

"Great!" she grinned up at him. "I was just working on my piano lessons. Mom and Dad went away for awhile. They told me to tell you that they're visiting my grandpa's grave. They said you would know what that meant." The three old friends exchanged glances.

"Yes, we do know what that means," Odd said seriously. "So tell me Maya, is there a panel outside that leads to some tunnels?" When Maya nodded, wide-eyed, Odd thanked her. "I'm going to go see them and find out if they need me to do anything. Or go anywhere," he added. "I think we left our old gear down there, so I should be back soon." He hugged Maya, and waved goodbye to me, and went out the door.

Immediately, I pelted my parents with questions. "What's at her grandpa's grave? What's in those tunnels? What old gear? Where is Odd going? Can I go too?"

"I thought you didn't care," Mom said carefully.

"I care when I'm being left out of something. And I care when I feel like you're avoiding my questions, which you are. Out with it!" I demanded, knowing I sounded like a spoiled brat.

"All you need to know," Dad said, obviously picking and choosing his words "is that you should never go down into those tunnels unless it's an emergency, and if anything strange happens, you need to let your mother or I know."

"Or Jeremy or Aelita or Odd, but no one else," my mom added.

"Strange how?" Maya asked timidly.

"Electric shortages, machines acting on their own, swarms of animals, monsters, or people acting unusual," Dad listed, counting off on his fingers. "Did I miss anything?" he asked Mom.

"Only the giant teddy bear," Mom laughed, and I knew from the look in her eyes that she was joking. She had to be.

"If any of these happen, head straight for the tunnels and go where they lead you. We've placed markers so you can see. Call one of us immediately and don't take risks. Don't play the hero," Dad told me. "Leave that to the experts."

"You can't mean you two," I teased, but looking in their eyes, I knew they were serious.

"This isn't a game or a movie," Mom said seriously "no matter how much it may act like one. I want to be sure that you'll look after yourself, You, too, for that matter, Maya," she added to Maya. "We only want you to be safe."

"Why wouldn't we be?" I asked, but three bleak faces wouldn't answer.

"Just be careful, Yuri," Dad said quietly, and walked away, leaving me with the pink-haired girl, alone and afraid.


	2. Chapter 2

An hour passed, and I was curled up in a ball on an antique, fraying armchair, out cold. It probably didn't help to have Maya play lullabies when the traveling was so exhausting, and my parents' worried behavior was so exhausting. I blamed it mostly on the time difference and utter boredom.

I was woke from my jet lag-induced slumber with a start, a yip, and a feeling that my face was covered with drool that was not my own. As I looked blearily down, I saw its source: a Border collie, looking up at me reproachfully. In apology, I reached down to scratch it behind the ears.

"I see you've met Iwik," a voice behind me said. I jumped, and looked behind me. A boy about my age came in carrying two drinks. He graciously handed one to me. "I'm sorry I interrupted your sleep, but we're going to visit our school soon."

I couldn't think of anything to say, except that he was way too polite to be my age, which was inappropriate, considering how cute it made him seem, and how I didn't know who he was, which would be rude to ask.

"My name's Richie Della Robia," he said, reading my thoughts. "You must be Yuri Stern." I nodded, still slightly at a loss for words.

Finally, I asked, "Iwik is your dog?"

"Yes," he said, smiling. "I love him to death and couldn't leave him behind. Since they don't allow dogs on-campus, he'll have to stay here."

"He's gorgeous," I said, continuing to pet him behind the ears, "but he has a weird name. Why's he named Iwik?"

"It's making fun of Dad's old dog, Kiwi. Kiwi was never very smart or well-behaved, but Iwik always was, even as a puppy. So we gave him Kiwi's name backwards," he explained. "Iwik is the smartest dog you will ever find."

"Nice," I said, inadvertently switching to English. "Awesome dog."

"You speak English?" Richie asked in the same language. "Awesome!" Suddenly he didn't sound as polite. I bit back a laugh, mostly.

"That's why you sounded so stiff," I grinned. "French is brand-new to you, isn't it?"

"Yeah," he said ruefully. "I'm actually from America."

"So am I," I giggled. "I just heard French all my life is all, from my parents."

"I might have heard some French," Richie admitted, "but Dad knows so many languages, it's hard to know when he's speaking French. And Mom just adores English."

"Hey, kids," Uncle Odd said, bouncing his way into the room and scratching Iwik behind the ears absently. "Ready to go see old Kadic Academy?"

"Sure," I said, matching his French, and Richie echoed me.

"Let's hop to it, then!" he said, almost following his words literally. I caught Richie's eye and raised an eyebrow. With his smile encouraging me onward, I made my way after my Uncle Odd's jumping purple suit.

"Look at that, you get to share a room with Maya!" Aelita smiled at me as I collected my schedule from the pink-haired lady. "I hope I get to see you some more!"

"Me too," I said, since Richie was close by. "Hey, does Maya speak English?" I asked.

"Not fluently, but I'm sure she knows the basics. Would you feel more comfortable if I put you with someone else who spoke it?"

"No, that's okay, I was just wondering. Richie, you know, Odd's son, doesn't speak it very fluently, and I wanted to find some other English-speakers to hang out with us," I explained.

"Well, there's always the aspect of teaching her," Aelita said.

"Good idea," I said. "Thanks, Mrs. Belpois."

"Please, call me Aelita. No "Mrs." required. But," she added under her breath. "you'll want to call my husband Mr. Belpois. You don't want to come off as a teacher's pet. Even Maya is calling him that. He'll be you're science teacher, and watch out! He's tough."

"He doesn't look very tough," I said, watching him splutter with Richie's schedule. It's hard to believe that such a strong, carefree woman like Aelita could marry such a wimpy man.

"Looks aren't everything. You'll learn that in time. The sooner you do, the better. The safer," she added under her breath as I walked away, leaving me unsettled. I knew I wasn't supposed to hear.

The dorm looked decent, although I still wasn't sure why I was in a dorm. Or, for that matter, why Maya was. The Hermitage was within walking distance of the school; why stay here? Mom told me that she didn't stay in a dorm, that she lived with her parents. Why should I go through what she didn't?

"Hey Maya," I said, dumping my suitcase on the bed that didn't have a frilly pink bedspread and flopping down next to it. "Does this dorm thing suck or what?"

"Uhhh...what?" she said timidly.

"You like this undeserved punishment, this...this...blasphemy?" I cried, not knowing the French word for crap. "It's stupid, and unreasonable! Your house is five minutes away, and my grandparents' house is not much farther!"

"I think we're security cameras. You know, figuratively," she added when I stared, "we're supposed to watch out for suspicious activity and, you know, report it if we see it."

"Like what suspicious activity?"

"Like the stuff your parents told us about. If we see anything like that, we're supposed to tell our parents and hide like little kids."

"But what makes you think this sort of thing will happen again?" I asked, still puzzled.

"Because it's happened before," Maya said mysteriously. "All sorts of things have been going on: power surges, government inspections. They even quarantined that old factory across the way. The city keeps putting off searching it because there are rumors that it's haunted. But the weirdest thing by far happened not too long ago, when I was nearly electrocuted."

"What!"

"Dad said that I probably had too many things plugged in, but he was never a good liar, and I know what I saw. A huge orb came out a shocked me, some sort of electric monster. When I told Mom, she just said that the volts scrambled my memory, but she isn't very good at lying, either." Maya frowned at me. "What I can't figure out is why they would lie."

"You know what I say?" I said quietly. "I say we talk to Richie, Odd's son. Odd seems to be in on this too, but I doubt he's very good at keeping secrets from his son, or anybody. Maybe he knows something we don't."

"It's as good a plan as any," Maya agreed in her silent manner. "We'll see him at orientation, I suspect."

"Then let's go."

We didn't see him at orientation. What we did see, though, was that the principal, a Mr. Jim Morales, was full of hot air. A lot of hot air.

"Will this guy ever shut up?" I asked Maya, giving up the search for Richie after ten minutes of the principal's rambling. "He's such a gasbag!"

"I heard the principal before him was actually very good," she whispered. "Our parents went to school with his daughter, a girl named Sissy."

"Oh, I heard that she and a guy named William had a kid going here," I said, offhand.

"Wow, really?" Maya muttered. "You do know that Sissy had a huge crush on your dad, and your mom almost dated William, right?"

"What? No way!" I cried, as softly as I could manage. "That is too weird!"

"And sad," Maya murmured. "They both got rejected big time, so they had nowhere else to turn but to each other. If they weren't old enemies of my parents, I'd say it was romantic."

"As it is, I'd just say it's sick," I agreed.

"I just think it's sort of pathetic," a low voice behind us said, startling us both. "If it were me, I wouldn't have made such a fool of myself in the first place." We both turned to see a dark-haired boy with gleaming, thoughtful eyes. "Hi, my name's Andrew Dunbar. I think you were talking about my parents just now."


	3. Chapter 3

Richie's POV:

Something was going on with Dad. Jokes, laughter, and a reluctance to stand still are a normal part of his behavior, but now... Surrounded by old friends, it seems kind of forced, and Mom doesn't seem very happy either. And why does he keep warning me about weird stuff like large, rampaging teddy bears? It sounds like something out of one of his horror films, or music videos, or something. I had to find out what he was hiding, so I did the only reasonable thing possible.

I followed him. I already met Gasbag Morales, and I didn't feel like listening to a rambling seminar from him, especially when Dad was doing something different. I didn't really think he was doing anything illegal or immoral or anything, but if it's got him worried and Mom all tight-lipped, it's worth investigating.

Not to mention the whole moving thing. I'm nowhere near as psyched as I pretended to be. I want to know why I'm here, and with the stealth that a chief reporter like Mom would envy, I'm going to find out.

"Well, I'll be darned!" a gardener said, scaring me into a bush as he walked up to my Dad. "If it isn't the scrawny Odd Della Robia! Though not so scrawny now, I see."

"Too true," Dad said ruefully, grinning and slapping the gardener on the shoulder. "But I told you, I was never scrawny, I was-"

"Svelte, we know Odd, we know. It'll take more than a couple years to erase you from my memory, even as it is? Remember when you used to try smuggling spray paint out of the shed?"

"Ah, how could I forget?" Dad grinned. "You won't have to worry about that from my Richie. He inherited his mother's discipline, and good for him. He won't get in nearly as much trouble." I snorted with the irony, and quickly stifled myself as Dad looked behind him.

"Anyway, I'd better head on," the gardener said. "The new flower garden won't water itself."

Finally, the old folks moved on, with me on Dad's tail. We came to a clearing, and Dad stopped to look around at the trees. I stopped, but strained to listen as he started to talk.

"All the times together here," he murmured to himself, his telltale smile gone. "All the danger, all the laughter, all the family. It has brought us so much, but when we graduated, we each hoped we would never have reason to come back. Is it an act of Providence, of Fate for us to return, to resolve all that we hadn't before? And what exactly would that be anyway? All I have to do is take the plunge, and then I will know. Here goes nothing," he said, bending down, and pulling up a sewer hole covering. He lowered himself in, closing the hole behind him.

I counted to thirty, then followed him.

The first thing I thought I registered was the smell. I didn't question why Dad didn't want to return here. I wouldn't want to spend too much time in the sewers either. I couldn't see how anyone could get used to the smell.

Holding my nausea at bay, I grabbed a rusty scooter after wondering briefly how it got there. Following the sounds of dad's grunts and whoops, I navigated the sick-smelling sewers. He rounded a corner, than the sound of wheels ended. I skidded to a stop as soundlessly as possible, than looked around the corner.

"Ah...sweet nostalgia, here I come," Dad murmured, grinning. "Welcome back to Lyoko, Odd." With a brief check behind him, he began to climb the rungs of the ladder.

I counted again to thirty before following him, but maybe I counted a little fast. It really stank down there.

I got out of the sewer, inhaling deeply, then dived behind a nearby bush. I looked around, trying to get a grip on where I was. Dad was going out on a bridge, which led to...a factory. I gasped, realizing that it looked almost exactly like the factories that show up in his movies. Dark, spooky, decrepit, with some sort of monster at the end of it. I knew somehow, without even knowing how I knew, that Dad was going into danger's way.

But, without knowing what else to do, and not trusting myself to find my way back to school without him, I waited until he crossed the bridge, then followed cautiously.


	4. Chapter 4

Richie's POV:

"Odd, glad you could join us," Jeremy said after Odd swung down this long rope and landing with a clunk. "Now that everyone's here, I think we can begin."

"Hey, Einstein, when you're done with the teacher bit, you can start acting normal," Dad laughed, nudging him with his elbow. "It's all old friends here. And it's about time."

"Amen," Aelita grinned.

"Fine," Jeremy said, a little smile starting. "I don't know how, or why, but all the symptoms are here. XANA just might be back."

"We knew that," Ulrich said impatiently. "But how do you know? I thought the supercomputer was shut down, and that is the only way XANA could get to Earth, since we shut down all those Replikas."

"That doesn't mean that XANA couldn't have made more. Plus, knowing our slippery little friend, he probably made an escape route in case we got the anti-virus protocol from Dad," Aelita said. "Besides, it might _not_ be XANA. Dad might have made another virus to take over in XANA's absence. It just took a while to get powered up."

"A long while," Yumi said skeptically. "It's been what? Ten, twenty years? XANA only needed a couple days before he launched another attack."

"That's with us using the supercomputer like crazy and launching return trip after return trip," Jeremy said. "It took XANA eleven years with the supercomputer shut off to get power to attack, and even then, not enough to attack without turning the supercomputer on first. I'm not surprised it's taken this long. I'm just surprised it's taken this long for us to suspect it."

"So what are we going to do?" Ulrich asked. "Continue the cycle? Teach our kids to fight XANA, even though it's impossible to beat him? Scour the world for his hiding place? We're not kids anymore, people. We can't fight XANA forever, and eventually, he will succeed in doing what he's doing. It's only a matter of time."

"Our kids are _not _going to get sucked into this," Jeremy assured them. "Poor Maya already got electrocuted. I don't want them to feel too afraid. There's no reason to scare them out of their minds."

"Jeremy and I are working as hard as we can, me especially. I have oodles of free time. I can devote all day to this, and Jeremy can work during the breaks," Aelita said. "No one has to get hurt this time. We just have to be careful and think like adults. Like Ulrich said, we aren't kids. We won't act silly anymore."

"It's straight business," Jeremy agreed.

"And as straight business, I'll be straight about this," Dad said, in his Man of Steel voice. "We aren't doing our kids any favors by keeping this from them. If anything, we're putting them in greater danger. Jeremy, aren't you the one who always told me that knowledge is power?"

"And aren't you the one who always told me that ignorance is bliss?" Jeremy countered.

"You're a teacher. And if you haven't forgotten, the only way you could have never met Aelita if you hadn't discovered Lyoko. And Yumi and Ulrich would have never become friends, let alone more than that if it weren't for Lyoko," Dad said, getting angry.

"No one has forgotten anything, Odd," Aelita soothed, stepping between them. "If it becomes necessary, then we will tell them. Not before. Agreed?" she asked, looking back and forth. Reluctantly, both men agreed. "Then let's go take the plunge."

The group headed toward the decrepit elevator, but I headed back to the sewers, as gross as they were. I had seen enough, and more than enough questions. What is Lyoko? What happened to Maya? What is that supercomputer? What happened all those years ago?

Who is XANA?

Surprisingly, the trip back to school was quicker than the trip from it, maybe because I had forgotten to feel nauseous. My head buzzing with questions, I could barely think. I replaced the scooter and climbed back to the surface, preparing to ask Maya what happened to her. I was sure that Yuri had some interesting tidbits to share with me as well.

I found Maya outside the cafeteria, in the main courtyard, chatting with Yuri and some guy I didn't know. She was actually kind of good-looking, in a weird timid, pink-haired way. She took after her mother with her looks, but I could tell from the way she stammered that she got her attitude from her dad. The mix was oddly attractive.

Shaking those thoughts from my head, I took a seat next to her, listening to what sounded like the end of a joke from the dark-haired boy sitting across from her.

"...and Bob said, "No, I don't know him, but his face rings a bell." Do you get it?" he asked Yuri, who was shaking her head.

"Yeah, I get it. That is Odd Della Robia-level cheese, though," she groaned. "No offense," she apologized when she noticed me.

"None taken. The name's Richie Della Robia," I introduced myself to the guy. "Odd Della Robia is my father."

"Andrew Dunbar. I think we're roommates," he informed me. "I was just getting to know some of my parents' old classmates' kids."

"Which, you know, isn't too confusing," Yuri grinned. "We were just talking about how lame our parents are. You know, old stories about how long it took for them to get together, and stuff."

"I heard it was love at first sight for my parents," Maya sighed. "And Dad said that Mom looked like a Maya instead of an Aelita, and when I was born, I looked so much like her, he named me after her."

"Very romantic," Yuri approved. "My parents were sparring buddies, and at first, they couldn't stand each other. Mom had a thing for Andrew's dad, which was returned, and Andrew's mom had a thing for my dad, which wasn't."

"And what that says for the family legacy, I don't even want to know," Andrew grinned.

"Mom basically asked Dad out and wouldn't take no for an answer," I said distractedly. "And you know, one thing led to another."

"Huh," Maya said. "Not so romantic."

"Hey, I heard that Dad was the lady's man of his generation," I defended him.

"That's not what I heard," Yuri joked.

"Well, what I just heard might make you think twice about my dad," I shot back at her.

"What did you hear?" Andrew asked.

"Well, it kind of affects them more than you," I said, my guard up.

"It's about Lyoko, isn't it?" he asked, shocking me.

"What do you know about Lyoko?" I asked. "I don't even know anything about it."

"My dad was a part of the team at one point. He told me the story so many times when I was a kid. He said those few days when he was a help were the only honorable days of his life. He wanted me to know so I wouldn't turn out like him," he said sadly.

"That's terrible," Yuri said, putting a hand on his shoulder.

"That's life," he shrugged. "I suppose I should tell you guys the story. It might just save your life if your here for the reason I think."

"It all started with a man named Franz Hopper..."


	5. Chapter 5

Maya's POV:

"Wow," I said. Yuri, Andrew, and Richie all nodded their heads. We were all at a loss for words.

"So, let me get this straight, and there's a lot to get straight," Yuri said. "Maya's grandfather created a virtual world and an evil virus that tried to take over the world, then went to that virtual

world, taking his daughter with him, like a dumb-ass, and shuts the whole thing down, which is how it stays for eleven years-"

"When my dad turns on the thing and meets my mom, who conveniently forgets everything and can believe her name is Maya until Ulrich, Odd, and Yumi go there and help her re-trap XANA and help her realize her name is Aelita-" I said.

"And they spend the next million years trying to first get Aelita out of there, then unattached to XANA, when XANA gets lose and possesses Dad, and when they finally get him free, they don't want him anymore, because XANA likes him too much, and they finally kill XANA and shut down the stupid supercomputer, Maya's grandfather getting killed in the meantime-" Andrew said.

"Only XANA isn't dead, and they're starting up the supercomputer again to take him down, but they may never take him down for good, and they know that, so Dad wants to tell us and train us so maybe we can stop him, but Ulrich thinks that'll only start a cycle, and it's only a matter of time. Which it is," Richie completed.

"So yeah. You're right, Maya," Yuri said. "This is a "wow" moment, definitely."

"But what are we going to do about it?" Richie asked.  
"There isn't much we can do," I said dejectedly. "No one except Uncle Odd really want us to know."

"That's not even really it, though, is it?" Yuri asked. "It's not about not wanting us to know, they don't think we can take it."

"That's a little harsh, Yuri," I said.

"Is it?" she asked. "My parents told me to hide if anything weird to happen. Why not just say, "Don't be the hero, because trust us, you aren't one." What a load of crap!"

"I thought you didn't know the word for crap," Richie said.

"I looked it up, but that's not the point," Yuri growled. "The point is that they don't trust us!"

"I don't how true that is, Yuri," I said. "My parents were plenty worried when I got hit by that attack. I trust them to trust us. They just don't want to put us through anything that might screw us up."

"I agree with Maya," Richie said. "But there's only one way to tell for sure what their purpose was."

"Which is?"

"We go ask. Look," Richie said, we all just stared. "I know where they are, we don't need to pretend not knowing when we do, and maybe now we can do something to help. And if you're right Yuri, it'll be a chance to prove that we're up for the task."

"I'm in," Andrew said, grinning. "I always wanted to go to the factory."

"I'm in, too, I suppose," Yuri grumbled.

The three looked at me.

"Do you really have to ask?" I grinned. "Of course I'm in."

I grimaced as I realized that being "in" meant going into a sewer.

"I hated it too," Richie said, noticing my look. "I know it doesn't seem likely, but you'll get used to it."

"Why do I doubt that?" I murmured, gritting my teeth as I lowered myself in.

"I wonder," Richie said as he followed me in, wrinkling his nose in disgust.

"Less sarcasm, more hurrying," Andrew said from below, where he waited with Yuri.

"Whatever you say, Mr. Enthusiasm," Richie grinned.

"Hey! I said _less_sarcasm, didn't I?"

I giggled and briefly forgot where I was, and then I saw a cockroach. I screeched and ran into Richie, who was just getting off the ladder.

"Take it easy, Princess," Richie grinned down at me, turning me around and grabbing my hand, squeezing it.

"Yeah, it won't hurt you," Andrew said. "But I will if we don't get there soon."

"So impatient," Yuri grinned.

"You know it. Lead away, Richie. There aren't enough scooters for all of us."

The journey was swift, but only because Yuri and Andrew kept flirting and Richie never let go of my hand.

To steady me. That's it, I told myself. Nothing more.


End file.
